NJ FIRE MUSEUM NEWS. NJ Fallen Firefighters Memorial Gets A Big Boost at Wildwood Convention (Over $10,000 in Donations) Hello Friends and Patrons!

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1 Educating Our Children, Preserving Fire Service Heritage, Honoring our Fallen Heroes NJ FIRE MUSEUM NEWS Organizational Notice The NJ Fire Engine & Equipment Museum at Allaire Inc, is a 501C (3) non-profit corporation originally chartered by the state of New Jersey to establish and operate a fire museum and fire safety education center at Allaire State Park. The organization is comprised of the NJ Fire Museum and the New Jersey Fallen Firefighter s Memorial. NJ Fire Museum News is our newsletter to museum patrons. Comments and newsworthy articles are invited. Please contact the editor by mail, or fax at the address listed in the How to Contact Us box in this issue. Issue 8 Volume 2 Visit the website at: Summer/Fall 2008 NJ Fallen Firefighters Memorial Gets A Big Boost at Wildwood Convention (Over $10,000 in Donations) Honorary Board of Directors The Honorable Thomas H. Kean, President, Drew University Mr. Ronald J. Del Mauro, President, St Barnabas Health Care System Monsignor Robert Sheeran, Seton Hall University Mr. Christopher H. Assenheimer, NJ State Fire Chief s Assn Mr. Scott Campbell, Campbell Supply Co. Inc. Mr. J. Fletcher Creamer, J. Fletcher Creamer & Son. Mr. George H. Heflich Sr. NJ State Firemen s Association. Mr. George R. Laufenberg, NJ Carpenters Fund William C. Margaretta, NJ State Safety Council Congressman Frank Pallone Jr., Long Branch Mr. Larry Petrillo, Director, Division of Fire Safety Ms. Rae Wallace, Fire Service Women of NJ The Honorary Board also includes a bi-partisan group of legislators from the NJ Assembly and Senate. Sculptor Brian Hanlon (left) and museum President Don Mulligan flank a sample of Brian s sculpture at the Baltimore Firehouse Expo in July. Thanks to Skip and Judy Carr, we were able to promote public awareness and support for our project at this annual East Coast event attended by thousands at very little cost to us. Brian is designing a centerpiece sculpture to be added to our existing memorial design. Please see the related story on page 9 Hello Friends and Patrons! We are closer than ever to our goal for ground-breaking to construct the museum and memorial! A series of fund-raising events through this past Summer culminating with a big boost for the Memorial at Wildwood has greatly benefitted our bank account! Continued Page 2 The NJ Fire Museum is a 501 c 3 non-profit, 100% volunteer staff.

2 PAGE 2 NJ FIRE MUSEUM NEWS Board of Directors Dale Bennett C. Bernard Blum Albert E. Burdge Jr. Helen Burns (Secretary) Robert Burns (Vice President) Skip Carr Judy Carr Roger Demareski David W. Horsnall David C. Horsnall Vahak Hovnanian Irven G. Miller Jr. (Chairman) Don Mulligan (President) David Napier Fred Richart (Treasurer) Timothy J. Smith Stanley J. Sickels Whitey Swartz (South Jersey) HOW TO CONTACT US! Write to us at NJ Fire Museum PO Box 241 Piscataway NJ Or contact the Admin Office to leave a message for the Officers at Tel (732) Fax (732) Or send via our website Continued from Page One If you have been on the fence thinking about joining us with a family or fire department membership, please do so now! While the Memorial fund-raisers have been especially successful this year, the Board of Directors remains committed to presenting our $2M Phase One construction plan for the museum to potential sponsors and donors. I must express gratitude to the many individuals, families and fire departments that have established new memberships or renewed existing memberships. This source of support remains the key element that enables us to move forward in the absence of state funds. As the 2008 muster season winds down, we hope to see you at Allaire State Park on October 18th. It s a nice park with a lot of attractions in addition to our muster. We met a lot of folks at Baltimore and in case you were wondering, let me reiterate how conservative we are with regard to funds. Our top priority is museum and memorial construction. Although we have to pay to print and mail the newsletter, every possible dollar we get goes into our savings and investment accounts to support construction! As was the case with Baltimore, our officers and volunteers pay their own way for gas, hotels and food. And thanks to Helen Burns we now participate in ShopforMuseums.com, a clever way of benefitting the project through your purchases at a wide range of businesses. Check out the article on page 10 and please use the service! Thank you for the continued support and encouragement. Don Mulligan President and Newsletter Editor ABOUT US Board Member and Membership Secretary Helen Burns Piscataway NJ This article begins a series introducing the members of our Board of Directors and Honorary Board of Directors. Helen Burns of Piscataway, NJ has been an active member of the Museum Board since She has served as our Membership Secretary since Helen has been recognized by the NJ Dept of Environmental Protection as our Museum Volunteer of the Year. Helen took the initiative to greatly improve the membership database and the processes of recruiting new members and encouraging renewals from existing members. She is also responsible for establishing the new museum and memorial websites and is a key member of the Volunteer Committee. Helen also holds key positions with the Central NJ chapter of the national vintage apparatus society and several nonfire related historical organizations in Central NJ.

3 NJ FIRE MUSEUM NEWS PAGE 3 NJ Family Fire Safety Muster Allaire State Park, Monmouth County Saturday October 18 th, AM to 3 PM Beautiful Allaire Park is on County Route 524, off Exit 31B of I-195, just West of Exit 98 of the Garden State Parkway. All apparatus and firefighters invited! Free public admission! Modest registration benefits museum building fund. To participate call Helen at (732) or fill out a muster from the website and mail it in. NJ Fallen Firefighter Memorial T-shirts and Sweatshirts on sale! Please call Don at (732) if you can bring a cadet firefighter team for friendly competitions. For more information visit the website at Any Fire-related activity is welcomed to contact Helen to participate!

4 PAGE 4 NJ FIRE MUSEUM NEWS Identifying License Plates on our Rigs During the annual fire engine muster of the Catskill Fire- Cats, held outside Andrew Leider s fire engine storage building on a very hot day this past June, fire museum volunteers placed custom-made ownership plates on all of our rigs stored at that location. The plates were made by students at Burlington County Vo-Tech through the efforts of Volunteer Josh Kavett. They aren t legal plates of course but when Andy opens his facility to public tours (probably next year) our rigs will be identified as visitors from NJ. We look forward to bringing them home once we have constructed a Home of our Own at Allaire! (above left) A close-up of our museum ownership plate. (above right) Vol Committee member Dale Bennett attaches a museum plate to one of our rigs at Middletown NY. FIRE ENGINE FOR SALE - Asking Price $1, Over the years, operating as the NJ Fire Equipment Company, Ernie Day our museum benefactor took in many used rigs as trades when selling new apparatus. Sometimes a trade-in rig was in fine shape; sometimes it required refurbishment and sometimes it didn t make the cut and went to a scrap dealer! Used rigs were popular with fire companies that couldn t afford a brand new rig. This was especially true in the days before municipal financing was available. In an undated post-card ad, this 1927 Sanford 500 gal pumper was offered for $1,400.00: Guaranteed delivered in good running condition! 3 years to pay! The post card stated the rig was completely equipped with ladders, suction hose, two booster reels, siren, spotlight, axes, nozzles and a 200 gallon booster tank. Not to mention those white-wall tires! Our archives state that this rig was traded from Leonardo, NJ and sold to Delmont, NJ, probably in the late 1940s.

5 NJ FIRE MUSEUM NEWS PAGE 5 Fallen Firefighter Memorial Draws Record Support at Wildwood! (above) Cathy and her sons, Matthew and Teddy make the rounds coordinating support for Memorial fund-raising events! Under the enthusiastic direction of Cathy Wasner Coursen, volunteers manned displays for the NJ Fallen Firefighter s Memorial at the recent Firemen s Convention in Wildwood. Over $10,200 was received from T-shirt sales and donations from the public! (above) The new museum and memorial display panels provide the backdrop to our table selling T shirts, memorial pavers and museum memberships in the Wildwood convention center. Sandy Burdge and Cathy Coursen man the table, talking with Memorial Committee member Tony Saranchak. This biggest fund-raising event to date capped a successful summer during which Cathy organized a series of fund-raising events with the support of ball teams around the state. In July, over 200 folks from South Jersey came out to watch the Phillies take on the Cardinals. We are looking forward to an even bigger event next year! We are now planning 2009 events. Why not help promote and man these events? Please contact Cathy via the Memorial website at NJfallenfirefightersmemorial.org Or contact Cathy directly at (732) or by at njfirememorial@comcast.net. (above) Many people stopped by our outside table to purchase Memorial T-shirts and sweatshirts and view our sample pavers. Thanks to Helen Burns and Denise Pietrucha for enduring the cool weather on Friday and warm sun on Saturday! We must express great appreciation to Mr Scott Campbell for his generosity is providing operating and storage space and the active assistance of his sales staff to promote the memorial at Wildwood! (left) Looking slightly terrified, attendees gather round the mascot at this year s Newark Bears benefit basketball game!

6 PAGE 6 With Great Appreciation to Our $1,500 Fire Equipment Vendors

7 With Great Appreciation to Our $1,500 Fire Equipment Vendors PAGE 7

8 PAGE 8 From The Ernie Day Archives NJ FIRE MUSEUM NEWS In Hard Times, there were Little Rigs with Big Names! As promised on the cover of our last newsletter, here is a story about some Little Rigs from the 1930s. As a result of the Great Depression, apparatus builders like Ahrens Fox, Seagrave and American LaFrance were getting few orders for their standard fire engines. In response, the companies introduced smaller custom rigs, like the Ahrens Fox shown at right center here. Other builders chose to build on less expensive commercial truck chassis. The problem with a more affordable commercial truck chassis was that in many cases, it strained to carry the weight of a fully-equipped fire engine. Hence everything about these rigs was scaled back. Ford and Dodge seemed to dominate due to a slightly advantage in horsepower but Chevy, GMC, Diamond T and other chassis were also used. (above) A Pirsch 500 gallon per minute pumper on a Dodge chassis delivered to New Market in (center) a baby Ahrens Fox, one of four delivered in the 1930s that served Hoboken. (bottom) A GMC chassis carried this Pirsch booster rig built for Sicklersville in (Photos from Ernie Day archives) Sure, the rigs were smaller compared to full-size custom apparatus. The little Hoboken rig (center right) served alongside a fleet of massive Ahrens Fox piston pumpers. Wonder if it had an inferiority complex! During 1935, The NJ Fire Equipment Co managed to sell only 10 new rigs. Eight were 500 gal per minute pumpers, like the New Market rig on a Dodge chassis (top right). The other rigs went to Lavallette, North Branch, Seaside Heights, Glendola, Port Norris, New Egypt and Spotswood. The last two 1935 deliveries were Pirsch booster rigs (no pumps) that went to Greenwich and Sicklersville. These last two were real Plain Janes, (bottom right) The economy rebounded in response to World War II and the 1940s saw a return to big machines but the little rigs with big names of Pirsch and Ahrens Fox served well. Some survive today! Come to a New Jersey fire engine muster and you are likely as not to see one in person!

9 NJ FIRE MUSEUM NEWS PAGE 9 Noted NJ Sculptor: I intend to sculpt my greatest work for our Fallen Firefighter s Memorial Two of sculptor Brian P. Hanlon s recent New Jersey projects are the Pennsauken 9/11 Memorial at left and the Gloucester City Firemen s Memorial at right. While the former honors our national tragedy of 9/11 and the latter memorializes the local losses suffered in Gloucester City, they share the inspirational sculpture work that is Brian s hallmark. We are proud that Brian will create the centerpiece sculpture for our planned memorial. With over 200 public art pieces, Brian P. Hanlon has been dubbed New Jersey's Sculptor. Even so, many of his sculptures are not only in other states, but other countries. With the help of his wife Michelle, Brian Hanlon runs Hanlon Sculpture. The Toms River couple has four children. Brian has a Bachelor's degree in Art Education and a Master's in Sculpture. In creating his work, Brian s goal is to evoke feelings in those who experience his art as well as to educate others about the subject of the sculpture. Much of his enjoyment comes from depicting subjects who have achieved greatness in their lifetimes. Among his favorites are athletes. Brian's work has decorated places of worship. The Roman Catholic Church is one of his largest patrons. Many of Brian's pieces honor those we have lost. For his recent Memorial to 9/11, friends and families of the victims have expressed their need to have a memorial serve as the gravesite they do not have. Brian is proud to use his talent as a healing tool for those who mourn the loss of loved ones taken too young, too tragically, or too early. When the opportunity to present our project at minimal cost at the Firehouse Expo thanks to the efforts of Board Members Skip and Judy Carr, we realized the display we have used for over 5-years was showing its age. As noted in the Presidents column of this newsletter, we are extremely conservative with regard to spending museum funds but felt it was time for an investment in our future. At 7 feet tall, the new display (right) capture the vision and appeal of our 3 components, the Fire Museum, Fallen Firefighter s Memorial & Fire Safety Adventure Center. We hope that when you see the display in person at a public event you will agree that it looks great! Museum & Memorial Gets New Display

10 PAGE 10 NJ FIRE MUSEUM NEWS Do You Shop Online? Help The Museum & Memorial Project by Using ShopforMuseums.com! Raise Funds for The NJ Fire Museum & Fallen Firefighter s Memorial at No Extra Cost to You! The NJ Fire Museum & Fallen Firefighter s Memorial is excited to announce its involvement as a Museum Partner with ShopforMuseums.com. As a Museum Partner, anyone shopping online with their favorite national retailers can have a portion of their purchase directed to The NJ Fire Museum & Fallen Firefighter s Memorial at no additional cost. ShopforMuseums.com is nationally recognized with hundreds of Museum Partners across the country. Whether you are in the market for books, office supplies, apparel, gifts, travel reservations, home improvement, school supplies, toys, electronics, flowers or gourmet food You name it, the place to start is at ShopforMuseums.com! Participation is simple and secure. To designate a portion of your next online purchase to The NJ Fire Museum & Fallen Firefighter s Memorial, simply: Go to Log in. Under Museum Partners select: New Jersey Fire Engine and Equipment Museum (our official name). Then just click on the link of the store you want to visit and go about your shopping. Stores are organized by categories. The percentage of your purchase will be tracked automatically as long as you begin each time at ShopforMuseums.com. Please use ShopforMuseums.com each time you shop online and spread the word to friends and family. The NJ Fire Museum & Fallen Firefighter s Memorial appreciates your support. Some of the Major on-line participating retailers: Founded five years ago by a former science museum director, ShopforMuseums.com is a national fundraising tool designed for museums to receive extra donation money. Interested individuals and businesses can shop online on the Fire Museum & Memorial's behalf and a percentage of every purchase is donated to our project at no extra cost to the shopper. Please take a few moments to sign in and use this creative new means of helping us reach our construction goal!

11 NJ FIRE MUSEUM NEWS PAGE 11 The New Jersey Stutz The Stutz Fire Engine Company was in business for a short period during which it managed to sell a fair number of apparatus to NJ communities. There are several excellent books on the subject. Today we highlight New Jerseys finest Stutz, a 1924 Model C that was originally delivered to Fords, NJ. Rescued from a salvage yard by Ed Burdge of Little Silver, the rig received a frame-up restoration over a 25 year period. She was rolled out to celebrate the 1997 national vintage apparatus society convention held at Lakehurst, NJ that year. Recently, the Fords Stutz was faithfully reproduced as a precision metal scale model, currently available in 1/24th or 1/43rd scale. The model is extremely accurate (below) and now the Fords Stutz will live on in thousands of homes around the world thanks to the labor of love invested by Ed Burdge. (Above) Ed Burdge s Model C Stutz at a Museum muster at Allaire State Park. Of course it is a prize winner wherever it goes! (Right) Ed is in his element repairing a vintage apparatus! Although recently retired as Chief Engineer of the Little Silver Vol Fire Co, Ed continues to lend his talents to the Fire Museum as well as to apparatus owners across NJ who seek his advice and mechanical expertise. Plan Ahead for 2009 Mark Your Calendar Now! May State History Fair at Washington Crossing (Central Jersey) May Malaga (South Jersey) The model version of Ed Burdge s Model C 1924 Stutz PO Box 1245 Wall NJ Tel (732) June Newark (North Jersey) June Jamesburg (Central Jersey) August Millville (South Jersey) September Boonton (North Jersey) October Allaire (Central Jersey) Be sure to visit the website for the details and specific dates as they are confirmed!

12 EDUCATING OUR CHILDREN, PRESERVING FIRE SERVICE HERITAGE, HONORING OUR FALLEN HEROES Presort Standard US Postage PAID Asbury Park, NJ Permit 85 New Jersey Fire Museum & Fallen Firefighter s Memorial 175 Washington Street Long Branch NJ A vintage rescue rig that once served Oceanic in Long Branch! More about this rig and others like it on the next issue! Summer/Fall 2008 Museum Membership Application Form Regular (Please circle dollar value) Bronze Silver Gold Platinum Other Individual $20 $40 $60 $75 $ Family $25 $50 $75 $100 $ Name Address City State Zip Corporate/Fire Co/Dept (Please circle dollar value) Bronze Silver Gold Platinum Other $75 $150 $300 $500 $ Address: (please be sure it is readable! Thanks!) Tel Number (optional) ( ) Please mail form and your check made payable to: NJFM P O Box 241 Piscataway NJ NOTE: We would appreciate having your address so we can send you the full-color newsletter electronically. The newsletter is transmitted as a PDF format file (up to 3MB).